4. On knowledge: "Suppose, your gall-bladder has to be removed this evening. Will you choose a surgeon who has read some books on anatomy and knows where to find your gallbladder, or a surgeon who relies on his intuition?"

5. On focus in an organization: "If we are to prevent the eventual disintegration of our world-wide church into a Tower of Babel, we must continue our evangelism, make sure that every office is headed by a member of the True Church, and not by a stranger and, never again entrust the supervision of offices to outsiders or lay brothers. This errors leads to schism, balkanization, apostasy, bankruptcy and ultimate disintegration."

6. On size in an organization: "If God is on the side of the big battalions, and that seems to be the case, the path of wisdom lies in becoming one of the big battalions."

7. On committees: "Search the parks in all your cities, You'll find no statues of committees."

8. On mergers: "Clients never like mergers. They hate them. They don't like their accounts being sold. I don't blame them. If my doctor said he had sold his patients to another doctor, whom I had never met and must consult for all future health care, I wouldn't jump up and down with joy."

9. On acquisitions: "Finance aside, I have always thought [acquisitions] a rickety way to grow. Good agencies are never for sale."

10. On hiring: "If you hire people who are smaller than you are, we shall become a company of dwarfs. If you hire people who are bigger than you, we shall become a company of giants. Hire Big People, people who are better than you. Pay them more than you pay yourself, if necessary."

11. On meritocracy: "No spouses. No nepots"

12. On corporate culture: "We treat our people like human beings. We help them when they are in trouble. We help our people make the best of their talents. Our system of management is singularly democratic. We abhor ruthlessness. We like people with gentle manners. We admire people who work hard. We despise and detest office politicians, toadies, bullies and pompous asses. The way up the ladder is open to everybody. In promoting people to top jobs, we are as influenced as much by their character as by anything else."

16. On firing people: "I think the most cruel thing you can do to people, especially I am sad to say, to men, is to fire them, to put them in a situation where they don't work. Always do your damndest to avoid condemning people to the hell of unemployment."

17. On losing clients: "Clients come, they go, they come back, we'll get a new one. The only thing that can affect who we are as a company is if [the Chairman] feels any less committed."

18. On clear and honest writing: "People who think well, write well. Woolly-minded people write woolly memos, woolly letters and woolly speeches. I believe in the dogmatism of brevity."

Stefan Jovanovich writes:

I hate to argue yet again with an Eddy Top 10 but the central fact of David Ogilvy and his successor's careers is that they allowed two kids from Stanford to swallow their entire business. The Mad Men were terrible snobs– even worse than their publisher and broadcaster vendors. As a result they lost out on an opportunity that the inventors of their business– Wanamaker and Stewart– would have jumped at the chance to develop. Ogilvy is also wrong about canning people; it is usually the kindest thing you can do to people if they cannot do the job. We all fail; the illusion of schooling is that somehow that law of nature can be repealed.

Richard Owen writes:

Interesting analysis Stefan! Indeed one of the anecdotes from Ken Roman is

Following a hostile takeover of his agency, Ogilvy was in the audience when the chairman of the acquiring company was asked what was next after buying J. Walter Thompson and Ogilvy 3: Mather. He had completed his goals, was the answer, and planned no further acquisitions. From the middle of the audience came a stage-whispered comment from the founder: "Just like bloody Hitler after Czechoslovakia."

Ogilvy states various things about firing people: I guess it was something along the lines of striking a balance, having long term vision, and being humane. Indeed, he encouraged one colleague who's passion wasn't advertising to pursue wildlife matters, and as a result became one of the pioneers of the WWF.

Gary Rogan writes:

In a significant percentage of cases "cannot do the job" is too definitive of a conclusion. Also, obviously people are often let go not because they cannot do the job, but a lot of other factors. It seems like not being too random in getting rid of people even if you can easily get away with it is a mark of a humane person.

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Shane Hurren on
August 13, 2014 7:47 pm

Thank God you got list from someone else to tell us about leadership —- we wouldn’t want to see one from you.